1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cooling apparatus for a semiconductor device, and more particularly to a refrigerated cooling apparatus for a semiconductor device capable of cooling heat of semiconductor devices using air heat-transferred in an evaporator, and being applicable to other kinds of semiconductor devices.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a typical semiconductor device comprising a diode transistor rectifier (SCR), a TRIAC, or the like, the increase of integration and the improvement of performance to process a data at a high speed causes the heating density to be increased.
Increased temperature of the semiconductor device is the reason why an interface flaking is happened at a juncture portion of the semiconductor device due to the heat expansion difference generated by a heat stress, a signal processing speed reduces, or other problems such as malfunction are happened.
In order to solve the problems, the semiconductor device is provided with a cooling apparatus to control an operation threshold temperature (a temperature of the juncture portion) of the semiconductor device.
The prior cooling apparatus 1 for a semiconductor device employs a forcible air-cooling method, as shown in FIG. 1, wherein air is forcibly circulated around the semiconductor device 10 to radiate the heat generated from the semiconductor device.
Such a forcible air-cooling apparatus 1 comprises a number of pins 11 provided on the semiconductor device 10 mounted onto the PCB 20 for easily radiating the heat through a heat transfer, and a heat radiating fan 12 rotating above the fins 11 for forcibly circulating the air by convection.
In case of reducing the temperature of the semiconductor device 10 using the heat radiating fan 12, a low frequency noise is generated due to the rotation of the heat radiating fan 12, and increased amount of heat radiation of the semiconductor device does not effectively radiate the internally generated heat through the pins 11.
Since a body case of a personal computer is provided with another ventilating fan (not shown) to supply external air to the semiconductor device and exhaust heated air therefrom, the supplied air containing dust and moisture causes the semiconductor device to be out of order.
A refrigerated cooling apparatus 2 is, as shown in FIG. 2, installed on the semiconductor device to increase the operation speed by reducing the temperature of the semiconductor device 10 or to overcome the limit of the cooling effect to be obtained by the forcible air-cooling apparatus.
The refrigerated cooling apparatus 2 comprises an evaporator 21 attached to an upper surface of the semiconductor device 10, through that a coolant of low temperature and low pressure flows, and a compressor 22 supplied with the coolant which is heat-transferred in the evaporator 21, a condenser 23, and an expansion valve 24.
Since the temperature of the evaporator 21 is in range of xe2x88x9220xc2x0 C. to xe2x88x9240xc2x0 C., if the air in the personal computer except for the semiconductor device to be cooled contacts with the evaporator, a frost phenomenon may be happened on the surface of the evaporator, thereby causing a serious problem in the operation of other components. Therefore, the evaporator 21 and the semiconductor device 10 are packaged after carrying out a heat insulating treatment.
The evaporator absorbs the heat generated from the CPU 10 of the personal computer using an evaporating latent heat of the coolant. If the air in the personal computer having a temperature of 40 to 50xc2x0 C. contacts with the surface of the evaporator 21 of xe2x88x9220 to xe2x88x9240xc2x0 C. lower than a dew point, however, the moisture contained in the air is condensed and frosted.
The refrigerated cooling apparatus 2 controls the temperature of the semiconductor device by the heat transfer due to the temperature difference between the semiconductor device and the evaporator.
Since the semiconductor device is packaged together with the evaporator 21, the construction thereof is complicated, and cannot be easily assembled.
In addition, in order to mount the cooling apparatus onto a mother board (not shown), means for connecting the cooling apparatus and the refrigerator has to be adequately provided.
Since the evaporator 21 is directly attached to the semiconductor device, in case of upgrading the semiconductor device, it is impossible to reuse the existing cooling apparatus, so that the compatibility thereof is deteriorated.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide a refrigerated cooling apparatus capable of effectively radiating the heat generated from a semiconductor device to improve an operation performance of the semiconductor device.
Other object of the present invention is to provide a refrigerated cooling apparatus capable of improving compatibility and workability, so that the apparatus can be installed, regardless of the shape of a semiconductor device or a semiconductor package.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a refrigerated cooling apparatus capable of improving a performance, by forming integrally an evaporator and a case.
To achieve the above object, there is provided a refrigerated cooling apparatus including a compressor for compressing a coolant at high pressure, a condenser, connected to the compressor, for condensing the coolant, an expansion valve connected to the condenser, an evaporator, connected to the expansion valve and the compressor, for evaporating the coolant, and a venting fan installed on the evaporator, wherein the evaporator is integrally installed to the case forming a cooling space for a semiconductor device, and is connected to the compressor and the expansion valve provided on an exterior of the case through a connecting pipe; the venting fan is mounted on the evaporator to be divided from the semiconductor device; and a circulating flow path is formed in the case, so that a heat-transferred air of a low temperature absorbs heat generated from the semiconductor device and flows to the evaporator.